The One Who Walks Behind

There was still chocolate on my fingers from the éclair we just ate.

One afternoon in Paris, I fell behind my colleagues, as I always do. One step of theirs requires four of mine, so at some point in every walk, I end up back here. A few steps short. The one who walks behind.

I looked up and there they were, ahead of me, walking into what must have been my nth arrondissement that day. I had lost count. And right there, the city started to unfold. Beautiful buildings, beautiful streets. Straight out of Emily in Paris. Except this time, it was me. People talking in French, going about their day like it was nothing. Strangers having a completely normal afternoon while I was standing there having the best moment of my life.

And there it is. I'm in France. And this isn't a dream.

The realization didn't come when I got the news, or when I packed my bag, or when I received my allowance for the whole trip, or even when I said my goodbyes and walked through those departure gates. It came here. Like this. Chocolate on my fingers and everything.

For three weeks, I had so many moments like that one. Let me tell you about some of them.

The Beginning

Let me start with the immigration at NAIA. I have never been interrogated that hard in my life. The questions kept coming like I was being cross-examined by the Supreme Court of Justice (which btw is nakakaputaragis). I think they thought I was being trafficked. I was not. Eventually they let me through and the long flight began.

I ended up in the middle seat of a three-seater. Shoes off, feet up the way my mama probably told me not to. I picked Interstellar and for the next few hours, I was fully in my own world.

At some point I looked out the window and saw the horizon. That long, quiet line where the sky meets everything else. I just stared. No thoughts.

Then on the screen I saw our flight path would pass over Switzerland. I waited. And then it came. The Swiss Alps. White. Enormous. A dream I only ever imagined, and somehow, there it was below me.

Then a flight attendant came with food. On the tray, a croissant. My first ever croissant. I took a bite and something clicked. Oh. I am actually going to France. And this isn't a dream.

The City Unfolds

The next thing I remember is me sipping a Coke in a different country. Some things don't change no matter where I am. Celine without a Coke is nothing.

The Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, Notre Dame, the Louvre, Versailles, Sainte Chapelle. One by one, each one hitting differently than the last.

The Musée d'Orsay is where it got me. We had VIP passes and somewhere inside I found Van Gogh's self portrait. I stood there longer than I meant to. Here's the thing about Van Gogh. His life was tragic. Really, genuinely tragic. But when you stand in front of his painting, the last thing you feel is sadness. The colors are vibrant. It does not match the story at all. And somehow that makes it even more devastating. I did not expect to feel that much in front of a painting. I walked away quieter than I came.

Versailles felt like paradise. The garden alone is a whole world. I did not want to leave. Sainte Chapelle stopped me completely. The windows. Floor to ceiling, every panel in color and light. Sometimes a place just takes your words. And the Eiffel Tower at night. It sparkles.

And then there was the side of France that didn't look anything like the postcards. We biked around Angers. We climbed Mont Mézenc. We visited castles, real ones, the kind that make you feel small in the best way. I didn't expect to love that part as much as I did. Paris was one kind of beautiful. This was another.

There it goes again. This isn't a dream.

The Quiet Moments

As much as this trip felt like one thing after another unraveling beautifully in front of me, there were also the quiet things. The routine we built without meaning to. The ones that somehow stuck just as much.

Every morning I woke up looking forward to one thing. Pain au chocolat from the boulangerie. Our colleague would come back with breakfast for everyone, without being asked, which is very sweet of him (shoutout to you idol).

Every night we climbed up to Montmartre. Not to pray. Just to be there. There was always someone busking, always someone dancing. At some point up there I stopped feeling like a tourist. It was my favorite way to end a day. But the best Montmartre memory is from one of our last nights where we brought our own wine in our own glasses and talked about life.

I am not a sharer by nature. I am socially awkward in a way that is hard to explain to people who aren't. But somewhere between the wine and the busking and the Parisian night, I found myself talking. Actually talking. About myself. To people I was still getting to know. I did not notice it happening until it already had. Up there on that hill, I felt free. Like a different version of me was possible. Like maybe she had been there all along.

You Belong There

Then one evening, the routine broke in the best way.

We had dinner in an apartment where the Eiffel Tower was just there, outside the window, like a lamp someone had left on.

The people around the table were CEOs, founders, people who had been building things for decades. I was the youngest in the room by a lot, and probably the least established by any measure anyone would use. They talked about things outside of what I know. I ate jamón ibérico for the first time. There was a cheese course, wine, a dish one of my colleagues cooked whose name I still can't remember. The whole thing felt like a scene from someone else's life.

But they were kind. Not in a polite way. In a comfortable way. The kind of kind where they just include you without making it a thing.

At the end of the night, walking back to our flat, one of my colleagues turned to me and said: you were there because you belong there.

I didn't know what to do with that. I still don't, fully. But I held it carefully the whole walk home.

The Solo Day

Most of the trip I moved with the group. But there were moments I broke away and tried it alone.

For the first time in my life, I was navigating a foreign country by myself. No one to follow. No one to ask. Just me figuring out where to go, how to get there, and where to eat. And I was fine. More than fine, actually. I was having a great time.

Turns out I learned some things about myself that day. Food wise? Full conservative. I walked straight into McDonald's and I am not ashamed. But experiences wise? Completely different story. I wandered, I explored, I said yes to things I normally wouldn't. Apparently I have two settings and they do not match at all.

I also learned that even though I feel socially awkward on the inside, what I apparently project on the outside is warmth. People smiled back at me. I think it's because I was smiling the whole time without realizing it.

Also there were many cute dogs on the way home and that alone made the whole solo trip worth it.

But the biggest thing I brought home from that day was simple. I can do this. I figured it out. On my own, in a country that wasn't mine, with a language I didn't speak. I did it anyway.

Walking Behind

After that trip, I said to myself, if tomorrow was my last day, I'd be okay. Not because nothing matters anymore, but because for three weeks, everything did.

The memories are still vivid. Like it happened just yesterday. I know at some point the details will fade, the exact street, the name of the dish, which castle was which. But I think what stays is the version of myself I met there. And I'd like to keep her.

There is still so much more. But I think I'll keep some of it for myself.

Let this be a reminder, to me, mostly, that the best things have a way of finding me when I least expect it. Walking behind isn't missing out. It's just seeing things in the order they were meant to be seen.

I'll be back, I promise. For now let me have my french fries (kiss) 😂

Merci. Au revoir. Bonjour.